Don't forget to mention how the guy who wrote Matthew basically went through all the old Jewish prophecies looking for anything that could be written into Jesus' story in any way to make him seem more legitimate, and how Paul didn't write the letters attributed to him since he was actually illiterate, and how Peter and Luke, who weren't even Jesus' disciples but lived after he died, basically made up their own religion around Jesus' teachings, and how the guy who wrote Revelations was probably on hallucinogenic mushrooms, and how the entire bible was essentially assembled by committee at the Council of Gnicea.

Basically all the New Testament horse shit as well as the Old.

Yeah. It gets so murky in there. It's like the entire Near East is tossed up in the air, and anyone's guess or made up shit goes. Basically everything you said is true, in a way. We were having fun on Mark Fulton's blog with Peter. Martyr, first pope, bishop of Rome. Nuh-uh. In the year 67, when he died, they were still Jews, and stayed Jews for a LONG LONG time. In fact they couldn't even get them to LEAVE. Gamaliel II had to order the "curse" on them to keep them out in the late 90's. "And STAY out". Even in 400 CE John Chrysostom was STILL bitching about them going to the synagogue.

Insufferable know-it-all.
Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music - Friedrich Nietzsche

"Scholars of the Bible have made significant progress in understanding the Bible over the past two hundred years, building on archaeological discoveries, advances in our knowledge of the ancient Hebrew and Greek languages in which the books of scripture were originally written, and deep and penetrating historical , literary, and textual analyses. This is a massive scholarly endeavor. Thousands of scholars just in North America alone continue to do serious research in the field, and thei results of their study are regulary and routinely taught, both to graduate students in universities and to prospective pastors attending seminaries in preparation for the ministry. Yet such views of the Bible are virtually unknown to the population at large". etc......

You have done a lot of work on this and I will study it - as time allows. The work that Dr. Bart Ehrman has done is widely recognised - even by those that do not agree with him in some instances. It is also true that many people attending church do not critically evaluate data, latest information - and I think are much poorer for it.
That the various seminaries hold different views with some more conservative whilst others are more liberal, is obvious.
As this seems to be a more appropriate thread to discuss this, your comments on the Sumerian texts as precursors to Genesis etc as previously posted will be appreciated.
Also the evidence for your comment "The Biblical texts have been changed many times. A good example is the "finding of Deuteronomy", by King Josiah. There are many many other re-assembling, and re-writes known to scholars"
Thanks for the post.

"Scholars of the Bible have made significant progress in understanding the Bible over the past two hundred years, building on archaeological discoveries, advances in our knowledge of the ancient Hebrew and Greek languages in which the books of scripture were originally written, and deep and penetrating historical , literary, and textual analyses. This is a massive scholarly endeavor. Thousands of scholars just in North America alone continue to do serious research in the field, and thei results of their study are regulary and routinely taught, both to graduate students in universities and to prospective pastors attending seminaries in preparation for the ministry. Yet such views of the Bible are virtually unknown to the population at large". etc......

You have done a lot of work on this and I will study it - as time allows. The work that Dr. Bart Ehrman has done is widely recognised - even by those that do not agree with him in some instances. It is also true that many people attending church do not critically evaluate data, latest information - and I think are much poorer for it.
That the various seminaries hold different views with some more conservative whilst others are more liberal, is obvious.
As this seems to be a more appropriate thread to discuss this, your comments on the Sumerian texts as precursors to Genesis etc as previously posted will be appreciated.
Also the evidence for your comment "The Biblical texts have been changed many times. A good example is the "finding of Deuteronomy", by King Josiah. There are many many other re-assembling, and re-writes known to scholars"
Thanks for the post.

THIS is the stuff I am interested in. I really do believe that history lessons are what make myths crumble. It baffles me how biblical scholars can still believe in the bible after all they have learned.

Thank you for taking the time to put all of this together.

I wonder if I can make a request though... When I told my parents that I no longer believed in god there was one thing that my mom said that stuck with me. She said that she knew her religion, Christianity, was the religion of the one and only true god because no other religion has the holy spirit. I wonder anyone who knows can give me some insight into where the holy spirit came from. In some of my reading, not sure if this is accurate or not, I found some info that the holy spirit is present in other religions but either as a kind of characteristic of god or something like that... Anyone have some light to shed on this for me?

(10-09-2012 03:18 AM)Fromgenesis Wrote: You have done a lot of work on this and I will study it - as time allows. The work that Dr. Bart Ehrman has done is widely recognised - even by those that do not agree with him in some instances. It is also true that many people attending church do not critically evaluate data, latest information - and I think are much poorer for it.
That the various seminaries hold different views with some more conservative whilst others are more liberal, is obvious.
As this seems to be a more appropriate thread to discuss this, your comments on the Sumerian texts as precursors to Genesis etc as previously posted will be appreciated.
Also the evidence for your comment "The Biblical texts have been changed many times. A good example is the "finding of Deuteronomy", by King Josiah. There are many many other re-assembling, and re-writes known to scholars"
Thanks for the post.

Here's the link to the Sumerian myths. It's in the OP of this thread. You may have missed it.

Thanks BB. Your knowledge of the subject (ancient texts, history) far exceeds mine and I would really be out of my depth to argue on this.
However, as a layman, it seems to me that one possibility for corresponding information is that it actually reports the same issues, with each having a different "spin". In other words, the issues being reported is not by implication false. There is this game that little children play called "telephone", where a message is repeated and the end result is either garbled or have little bearing on the initial message or..if it was very carefully repeated and "controlled" by the initial person, could be accurate.
The Bible claims to be truth and one can then ask the question - has what is reported as truth ever been proven as lies? No doubt, questions are raised from time to time and doubts cast.
My belief in the God of the Bible rests on faith but without having to put my head in the sand and ignoring issues. That is why I am delighted with your comments. As Christians, we often only discuss issues with other Christians and thus work from the same point of reference.
That there are questions that are very difficult to answer, goes without saying, but this does not by implication invalidate the Christian faith. As proof, it is obvious that (other) highly intelligent persons with the same set of facts that you have, come to a different conclusion.

Here's the link to the Sumerian myths. It's in the OP of this thread. You may have missed it.

Thanks BB. Your knowledge of the subject (ancient texts, history) far exceeds mine and I would really be out of my depth to argue on this.
However, as a layman, it seems to me that one possibility for corresponding information is that it actually reports the same issues, with each having a different "spin". In other words, the issues being reported is not by implication false. There is this game that little children play called "telephone", where a message is repeated and the end result is either garbled or have little bearing on the initial message or..if it was very carefully repeated and "controlled" by the initial person, could be accurate.
The Bible claims to be truth and one can then ask the question - has what is reported as truth ever been proven as lies? No doubt, questions are raised from time to time and doubts cast.
My belief in the God of the Bible rests on faith but without having to put my head in the sand and ignoring issues. That is why I am delighted with your comments. As Christians, we often only discuss issues with other Christians and thus work from the same point of reference.
That there are questions that are very difficult to answer, goes without saying, but this does not by implication invalidate the Christian faith. As proof, it is obvious that (other) highly intelligent persons with the same set of facts that you have, come to a different conclusion.

I can hook up a USB 3.0 stick to my computer and transfer 16GB of text (about 72,000 bibles) off of it in a matter of minutes, upload it to my server (which is actually a virtual machine on a shared network of thousands of physical processors with data storage in three different datacenters, on several RAID1 and/or RAID5 hard drive arrays, synced every couple of minutes), and distribute it to a thousand people at once, almost anywhere in the world, at up to 2mb/s with a data loss or corruption rate of about one bit in ten trillion, thanks to unambiguous multiplexed error/noise-resistant communication protocols like SCTP. I can store this data for thousands of years on flash memory, for tens of thousands with hardened flash, with no data loss or corruption. The data can be copied an infinite number of times, and if 4096-bit RSA encrypted with my private key it could be 100% guaranteed that you are reading my original, unaltered, legitimate version with no possibility that it has been edited or altered by another entity.

(11-09-2012 09:24 PM)Noelani Wrote: THIS is the stuff I am interested in. I really do believe that history lessons are what make myths crumble. It baffles me how biblical scholars can still believe in the bible after all they have learned.

Thank you for taking the time to put all of this together.

I wonder if I can make a request though... When I told my parents that I no longer believed in god there was one thing that my mom said that stuck with me. She said that she knew her religion, Christianity, was the religion of the one and only true god because no other religion has the holy spirit. I wonder anyone who knows can give me some insight into where the holy spirit came from. In some of my reading, not sure if this is accurate or not, I found some info that the holy spirit is present in other religions but either as a kind of characteristic of god or something like that... Anyone have some light to shed on this for me?

I am curious as to what that even means. What is 'the holy spirit'? What is it that she believes it is that is different?

Skepticism is not a position; it is an approach to claims.
Science is not a subject, but a method.

(12-09-2012 12:26 AM)Fromgenesis Wrote: Thanks BB. Your knowledge of the subject (ancient texts, history) far exceeds mine and I would really be out of my depth to argue on this.
However, as a layman, it seems to me that one possibility for corresponding information is that it actually reports the same issues, with each having a different "spin". In other words, the issues being reported is not by implication false. There is this game that little children play called "telephone", where a message is repeated and the end result is either garbled or have little bearing on the initial message or..if it was very carefully repeated and "controlled" by the initial person, could be accurate.
The Bible claims to be truth and one can then ask the question - has what is reported as truth ever been proven as lies? No doubt, questions are raised from time to time and doubts cast.
My belief in the God of the Bible rests on faith but without having to put my head in the sand and ignoring issues. That is why I am delighted with your comments. As Christians, we often only discuss issues with other Christians and thus work from the same point of reference.
That there are questions that are very difficult to answer, goes without saying, but this does not by implication invalidate the Christian faith. As proof, it is obvious that (other) highly intelligent persons with the same set of facts that you have, come to a different conclusion.

I can hook up a USB 3.0 stick to my computer and transfer 16GB of text (about 72,000 bibles) off of it in a matter of minutes, upload it to my server (which is actually a virtual machine on a shared network of thousands of physical processors with data storage in three different datacenters, on several RAID1 and/or RAID5 hard drive arrays, synced every couple of minutes), and distribute it to a thousand people at once, almost anywhere in the world, at up to 2mb/s with a data loss or corruption rate of about one bit in ten trillion, thanks to unambiguous multiplexed error/noise-resistant communication protocols like SCTP. I can store this data for thousands of years on flash memory, for tens of thousands with hardened flash, with no data loss or corruption. The data can be copied an infinite number of times, and if 4096-bit RSA encrypted with my private key it could be 100% guaranteed that you are reading my original, unaltered, legitimate version with no possibility that it has been edited or altered by another entity.